BayAreaHoopz wrote:Whether they're better or more efficient, there are a bunch of SGs I would rank above Ellis. He maybe in the top 10 but certainly not a top 3 or even 5 SG in the league. Aside from guys like Kobe, Wade, Johnson or any of those guys that made the All-Star team...I'd take these guys over Ellis....

Wesley Matthews - This guy has basically made Roy expendable. He's 25 years old and has nice size at 6'5. He's also a good defender.

Demar Derozan - He should have a breakout next season. He has prototypical size and athleticism to play the positon. He's a willing defender and good rebounder. Averaged 17 points this past season and I could see him breaking the 20 point mark in the coming season. He's also only 22 years old with tons of upside.

Others..that I would rather have

Evan TurnerAndre IguodalaWesley Johnson Aaron AffaloLandry Fields

Jesus, I have been pretty bad on Monta the last two or so years, but I would't go this far. I'd rather have Monta than most of the guys on this list

BayAreaHoopz wrote:Whether they're better or more efficient, there are a bunch of SGs I would rank above Ellis. He maybe in the top 10 but certainly not a top 3 or even 5 SG in the league. Aside from guys like Kobe, Wade, Johnson or any of those guys that made the All-Star team...I'd take these guys over Ellis....

Wesley Matthews - This guy has basically made Roy expendable. He's 25 years old and has nice size at 6'5. He's also a good defender.

Demar Derozan - He should have a breakout next season. He has prototypical size and athleticism to play the positon. He's a willing defender and good rebounder. Averaged 17 points this past season and I could see him breaking the 20 point mark in the coming season. He's also only 22 years old with tons of upside.

Others..that I would rather have

Evan TurnerAndre IguodalaWesley Johnson Aaron AffaloLandry Fields

I guess that's your opinion and I can say I'm glad you're not our GM.

Wesley Matthews is a solid player and was a steal for the Blazers, but the reason the Blazers didn't miss Roy was because Aldridge became one of the best offensive PFs in the game last year. Matthews was on my fantasy team and the guy completely disappears some nights, and will blow up 1-2 nights a week making some of his numbers look a lot better. Monta is also a solid man defender when allowed to play man to man.

DeMar Derozan has a weak handle and no jumpshot (although improving). Only a rebuilding team looking to dump contracts would choose him over Monta. He is pretty much an athlete/ project.

Iguodala is more of an SF than an SG but I can definitely see why you would make this choice.

Wes Johnson average 9 points on around 9 shots on one of the worst teams in the league (plenty of room for stat stuffers) and is like a year and a half younger than Monta. Still can't believe the Wolves took this guy over Cousins.

Afflalo is a solid player who you can make the argument for if you have more of a playmaker/scorer at SF, but swap him for Monta as is, and this team is worse. Same with Landry Fields.

People may look at how the team can still score without Monta, and Curry has better stats when he's out, but if you look at the amount of teams over .500 we've beat without Monta over the last 2 years, there is 1 team. We beat the Blazers last year, with a bunch of D-Leaguers playing while they rested their starters for the playoffs. Don't see why we would want to trade our most unstoppable scorer and 2nd best defender. Let's get this guy some solid complimentary players. Also no matter how you want to rate him, he is sill the highest rated player at his respective position for any player on our roster.

BayAreaHoopz wrote:Whether they're better or more efficient, there are a bunch of SGs I would rank above Ellis. He maybe in the top 10 but certainly not a top 3 or even 5 SG in the league. Aside from guys like Kobe, Wade, Johnson or any of those guys that made the All-Star team...I'd take these guys over Ellis....

Wesley Matthews - This guy has basically made Roy expendable. He's 25 years old and has nice size at 6'5. He's also a good defender.

Demar Derozan - He should have a breakout next season. He has prototypical size and athleticism to play the positon. He's a willing defender and good rebounder. Averaged 17 points this past season and I could see him breaking the 20 point mark in the coming season. He's also only 22 years old with tons of upside.

Others..that I would rather have

Evan TurnerAndre IguodalaWesley Johnson Aaron AffaloLandry Fields

Jesus, I have been pretty bad on Monta the last two or so years, but I would't go this far. I'd rather have Monta than most of the guys on this list

Yeah, the thing is that I'm not sure anyone on here is really arguing that Monta is a top 3 SG - although most of us probably agree that offensively he is, but not overall. That list of guys is pretty weak.

Again, everyone is so focused on the offensive part of the game that they don't see what would be needed to actually win games. Yes, scoring 24 a game is nice but if it doesn't help you win games, then its all for nothing. Those guys I listed have several skills that this team could use to win games whether its defense or passing. Evan Turner hasn't proved much yet, but his upside is well above Ellis' ceiling. Affalo is a tough defender. Iguodala may not be a 20+ point scorer, but he can defender, rebound and pass the ball. Derozan is a still very young and as a 6'7 SG, is a defensive upgrade to Ellis. This team has scorers in Lee, Curry and Wright. What they need is defenders and team players to get some wins.

One thing really bothers me here, so I have to say something. For how long are we going to listen to that phrase "Scoring is good, but if you can't win games, it's for nothing"?

First of all, this is a team game, and one player's scoring ability or defense for that matter, can't decide the game alone, it can be of big importance, but one player can not win the game by himself. Ellis pretty much outscores most of other teams' guards, and his defense is good enough to keep their points below his, so he is doing his part. What more can you ask of him? Not to let his player score at all? Score 50 a game? The point is that Ellis does all he can, he scores, in various ways, makes his own shots, off the dribble, jump shots...he has above 5 assists a game as well, and he is a clutch player which is hard to find. And still, his defense is not as half bad as some of people here try to make it look like.

And on top of that, you (BayAreaHoopz) go as far to compare Evan Turner to Monta?! Oh, come on now. Really? Give me a break with all that "potential" thing. He was a second pick overall, and didn't do anything worth mentioning, not even a regular starter for lousy Sixers. Afflalo...a tough defender you say. He is...and? What else? Nothing. We would be so much worse if Afflalo was to replace Monta, that it's just not comparable. Double teams on Monta, when he slashes in, and pass it out, or inside to Lee and makes confusion for opponents, are things that make Wright look like a scorer. Without Monta, or someone who can make the mess in opponents defense you will see how hard it would be for Wright to even repeat numbers from this last season.

Igoudala is good, and it would be a close call, that much I admit. And DeRozan is a good player, I like him, but before he learns to hit jumpers on regular basis, and learn to shoot 3 pointers, I ain't giving Ellis away.

In the end, we need interior defense, and you will see how fast the wins will come...and Monta Ellis would still be a leader, and would do his thing.

BayAreaHoopz wrote:Again, everyone is so focused on the offensive part of the game that they don't see what would be needed to actually win games. Yes, scoring 24 a game is nice but if it doesn't help you win games, then its all for nothing. Those guys I listed have several skills that this team could use to win games whether its defense or passing. Evan Turner hasn't proved much yet, but his upside is well above Ellis' ceiling. Affalo is a tough defender. Iguodala may not be a 20+ point scorer, but he can defender, rebound and pass the ball. Derozan is a still very young and as a 6'7 SG, is a defensive upgrade to Ellis. This team has scorers in Lee, Curry and Wright. What they need is defenders and team players to get some wins.

Well scoring does help you win games if you have a complete and balanced team. And Monta is not a bad man defender when he is allowed to play man to man. He defended the leagues best offensive players pretty well (Durant, Rose, Kobe, Roy). Monta rarely gets posted up, and due to his speed, is not at nearly the disadvantage some people here seem to think he is. He struggles most with guys who move well offball, and guys who are not offensive threats due to our SCHEME. If you watched games, you would notice that since we probably had the worst defensive front court in the NBA, Monta was ALWAYS asked to double (except in games where we had him lock down one guy like the above mentioned). We were basically leaving his guy open and daring him to beat us more than opposing frontcourts since that was the only chance we had.

Being 6'7 does not mean you will be a good defender. Lateral quickness, a tenacious attitude and an understanding of TEAM defense makes a defender good. If athleticism and size were all it took, Amare Stoudemire would be 1st team all defense. DeMar DeRozan was on a worse defensive team than Ellis. So based on the logic some people use here to qualify him as a terrible defender, he is actually worse on both ends of the floor.

Like I said players like Afflalo and Fields are tough defenders, but that's because that's the ONLY way they can see the floor for 35 minutes a night. They are not outstanding defenders, just balanced players. If Monta was as good at defense as offense (these guys have that balance moreso due to their offensive limitation than anything) and had to try as hard on both ends of the floor (impossible playing 40 minutes a night and being the #1 option), he would be a top 5 player in the NBA. Don't get me wrong, I really like Afflalo, but the only way I take him over Monta is if we have a SF who can create his own shot.

And besides Iguodala and MAYBE Turner (in college), none of those guys are better passers. They are willing passers because some of them can't shoot, and they can make the extra pass, but none of them can create off the dribble and set team mates up in the halfcourt (another thing Monta is best at on our team).

If you want to trade one of our backcourt based on the justification that all they do is score and can't play defense, you trade Curry. He is a PG who can't run a pick and roll, and is currently extremely held back in half court sets. Building a team around a PG who excels only in the opencourt and can't play defense has never won a championship. BTW I am not saying we should trade Curry, just that the justifications people use to trade Monta hold more true to many of our other players. Everyone on this team takes shots that will make you say WTF? and everyone leaves guys wide open due to a terrible defensive scheme. Monta is just the scapegoat because he's not Kobe or Wade it seems.

Why trade Curry since they'll still be undersized in the backcourt with whomever they get to replace him? Everyone has their own opinions and some here seem to think that Ellis helps his team win, but my opinion differs dramatically. Ellis hasn't help this team win since coming into the league. Has Ellis taken them to the playoffs yet? Have they even won 40 games with Ellis as the key player? No to both. Then I don't think a statement like "Ellis helps them win games" holds any truth to it because it just hasn't happened yet. As for his defense. We must be watching totally different games. The games I watch has Elllis playing very little to no defense unless you call swiping at the ball and letting your man blow by you defense.

He defended Kobe and Durant well? I think you're basing that on those one games that those players struggled offensively. Both of them averaged 30+ points against the Warriors this past season. And Ellis rarely gets posted up? You might want to watch this highlight of a game against the Lakers in April. He was making Ellis look so bad by posting him up they put Dorell Wright on him. Wright actually guarded Durant in their games against OKC and Curry guarded Rose.

BayAreaHoopz wrote:Why trade Curry since they'll still be undersized in the backcourt with whomever they get to replace him? Everyone has their own opinions and some here seem to think that Ellis helps his team win, but my opinion differs dramatically. Ellis hasn't help this team win since coming into the league. Has Ellis taken them to the playoffs yet? Have they even won 40 games with Ellis as the key player? No to both. Then I don't think a statement like "Ellis helps them win games" holds any truth to it because it just hasn't happened yet. As for his defense. We must be watching totally different games. The games I watch has Elllis playing very little to no defense unless you call swiping at the ball and letting your man blow by you defense.

He defended Kobe and Durant well? I think you're basing that on those one games that those players struggled offensively. Both of them averaged 30+ points against the Warriors this past season. And Ellis rarely gets posted up? You might want to watch this highlight of a game against the Lakers in April. He was making Ellis look so bad by posting him up they put Dorell Wright on him. Wright actually guarded Durant in their games against OKC and Curry guarded Rose.

Are you really faulting him for not carrying our roster to the playoffs the last 2 years? One in which we had a crap roster that also had the second most injuries in NBA history! No one short of Lebron, Wade or Dwight could have taken that roster to the playoffs. You can't fault him for not being one of those guys. I guess he's terrible and can't help a team win (let's not forget that he was basically a 2b option averaging 20 PPG on very good efficiency - historic efficiency at times- for a 48 win team rotating Al Harrington and Pietrus at PF). Let's also fault him for a guy 7 inches taller and is the 2 time reigning scoring champ for scoring his average against Monta. The fact that Monta was even asked to guard him shows you how bad our roster is.

And that is only one guy who is the best post up guard in the game posting him up. Kobe posts up any guard he wants. He can do it with his eyes closed and has proven this for years. He even posts up strong SFs with hands in his face like Battier who is one of the best defenders of the last decade. Again let's fault Monta for not being better than that on defense.

You don't think Smart puts Monta on these scorers because he believes it gives us the best chance to win. Or do you know more about our roster than the coaches who spend every practice with them?

And you trade Curry instead of Monta (based on how you think our guards should be playing) because Monta is a better defender than Curry, and was actually a better PG last year too. Just saying based on your argument of wanting defense or players that play both ways, that Curry should be the player your asking to trade. Monta can guard PGs, Curry cannot. And like I said before, no I do not want to trade Curry. Our backcourt is not why we didn't win 40 games last year. It's why we won more than 15 games.

BayAreaHoopz wrote:Why trade Curry since they'll still be undersized in the backcourt with whomever they get to replace him? Everyone has their own opinions and some here seem to think that Ellis helps his team win, but my opinion differs dramatically. Ellis hasn't help this team win since coming into the league. Has Ellis taken them to the playoffs yet? Have they even won 40 games with Ellis as the key player? No to both.

I am not going to argue here, becuase I think I have argued enough that we should keep Ellis and get better help, and a better defensive scheme around him.

His rookie season... well lets just say he didn't get playing time. 06-07 was the year we made it to the playoffs... he started 53 games that season. 07-08 was the year after we lost Jason Richardson and he started for most of the season (72 games). That year we won 48 games. We didn't make the playoffs, I thnk that is the most games a team has won during the regular season and not gone to the playoffs.

After that he hurt is ankle in the offseason... we lost BD, we lost Al Harington, picked up Maggette, and the following seasons just had a very bad team.

So, answer to your question:Has Ellis taken them to the playoffs yet? Have they even won 40 games with Ellis as the key player? No to both. No to the first, but yest to the second. He was a key player the year we went to the playoffs, but he didn't "take" us there. We had a solid team.

And that is what everyone is saying they want, to build a solid team around him. We need to see big improvement from David Lee and Bedriens this next season to make the playoffs. But if we do, and if we get a decent deffensive strategy, we will win 40+ games. Lee needs to get stronger, and Bedrins needs to get his head in the game on both sides. Then if we are lucky, Udoh will be stronger and be a factor of the bench at PF, blocking shots and starting to post up. And maybe we can see some help at the C.... who knows maybe this Tyler kidd can make a decent backup C, or maybe we will still pickup a C in FA.

GSW Hoops Fan wrote:No to the first, but yest to the second. He was a key player the year we went to the playoffs, but he didn't "take" us there. We had a solid team.

He was far from a key player during that playoff season. There was a stretch of games that Baron Davis missed and this team went on a big losing streak with Ellis as the starting point guard. With Ellis as the starter, this team won 5 out of 17 games. In the playoffs, he averaged 21 minutes a game. The key players in that season was 1) Baron Davis, 2) Jason Richardson and 3) Stephen Jackson. You could even argue that Andris Biedrins, Al Harrington and Kelenna Azubuike played a bigger part than Ellis in that playoff season.

GSW Hoops Fan wrote:No to the first, but yest to the second. He was a key player the year we went to the playoffs, but he didn't "take" us there. We had a solid team.

He was far from a key player during that playoff season. There was a stretch of games that Baron Davis missed and this team went on a big losing streak with Ellis as the starting point guard. With Ellis as the starter, this team won 5 out of 17 games. In the playoffs, he averaged 21 minutes a game. The key players in that season was 1) Baron Davis, 2) Jason Richardson and 3) Stephen Jackson. You could even argue that Andris Biedrins, Al Harrington and Kelenna Azubuike played a bigger part than Ellis in that playoff season.

I believe Ellis was a key player in getting us to the to the play offs, but he didn't do sh*t in the post season. Beans was certainly a key player.

GSW Hoops Fan wrote:No to the first, but yest to the second. He was a key player the year we went to the playoffs, but he didn't "take" us there. We had a solid team.

He was far from a key player during that playoff season. There was a stretch of games that Baron Davis missed and this team went on a big losing streak with Ellis as the starting point guard. With Ellis as the starter, this team won 5 out of 17 games. In the playoffs, he averaged 21 minutes a game. The key players in that season was 1) Baron Davis, 2) Jason Richardson and 3) Stephen Jackson. You could even argue that Andris Biedrins, Al Harrington and Kelenna Azubuike played a bigger part than Ellis in that playoff season.

That shows how much you watched that season. Just because he wasn't the MVP of that team does not mean he wasn't a key player. The guy guy league MIP while contributing to that playoff team. The following year he was a major contributer on a 48 win team. Since then, his supporting cast has been terrible. Maybe 3 players in the NBA in place of Monta would have gotten us to the playoffs if they replaced him the last 2 years. Basketball is a TEAM game. We can keep on to our good players, or we can continue to be the Clippers and blame individual talents for not carrying a terrible organization to the playoffs, then let other contenders add them to situations they can succeed in. Grizzlies were really thankful they got Randolph from a situation he couldn't really succeed in. That "career loser" Zach Randolph just schooled perhaps the greatest PF or all-time.

If you know of any players doing more with less, I'm all ears. Until then, stop reaching so much or you'll pull a muscle.

I could easily say the same thing about how many games you've actually watched that season. If Baron Davis didn't come back along with Stephen Jackson, with Ellis as the starting point guard..this team wouldn't of made the playoffs. So, would you call him a key player? I do concur that he was a key to their 48 win season, but was he the best player on that team even though he scored 20 points a game? Nope he wasn't and it can be argued if he was even the second best player next to Baron Davis. Yes, this is a team sport. Is Ellis really a team player? If you've watched as many games as you say you did, then you would see that is also debatable. Using Nellie's coaching plan as an excuse to his lack of defense isn't going to cut it either. I'm sure Nellie didn't tell him to not play defense or to force shots over 3 or 4 defenders. I guess we'll all have to see how he plays under a coach like Mark Jackson.